Ralph Baer, the father of video games, died this week in his home in New Hampshire at the age of 92. Few of his heirs—the millions who spend hours each day playing video games—mourned. Most likely, they did not know Baer’s name, which has become the answer to an extra-credit question, trivia for nerds alone to entertain. It’s understandable: Even though Baer produced the first version of a home video game console, he was soon eclipsed by more audacious marketers, by better businessmen, by swamis who knew the right chants to sweep the masses. But Baer understood more than the hardware of video games; he divined their spirit, too. For that, no tribute can ever suffice.
Born in Germany in 1922, he was expelled from school by the time he turned 11, forced by the country’s newly passed racial laws to attend an all-Jewish institution. Two months before Kristallnacht, his parents fled to New York, where the young boy, lacking much formal education, found work in a factory for $12 a week. Electronics, however, were his passion, and he quit his job as soon as he could afford to and enrolled at the National Radio Institute, where he studied to become a technician. This specific skill set led him, once World War II erupted, to the military intelligence division of the U.S. Army’s London headquarters, where Baer had the opportunity to tinker with the best and latest gadgets. When he returned home, Baer used his G.I. Bill allotment to become one of the nation’s first recipients of a bachelor’s degree in television engineering, even though TVs were still scarce in America’s living rooms.